Here we are! As always, I do not own Naruto.

Enjoy!

From the moment that Iruka announced the start of the match, Kumo was put on the defense. Kiba was very much like Naruto was when she had first met him-hit first and ask questions later. This also meant that it gave her a small upside in this match.

"I bet you don't even know how to fight!" Kiba swung his right fist, aiming for Kumo's face. "And I'm sure those so-called tracking skills of yours are a fluke, just like your dodging abilities!"

Kumo brought her arm up and blocked his incoming fist only to have to drop to the ground to dodge his foot as he countered her block. She placed her hands on the ground behind her in a fluid motion and jerked her foot upwards in hopes of catching her opponent in the chin, frowning slightly when her foot didn't contact anything.

"Bark!"

Kumo heard Akamaru barking and slammed her body to the ground and rolled towards the center of the ring before jumping back up to face the Inuzuka.

Kiba once again charged at Kumo in full force, his fist slightly behind his head as he tried to land a punch on the red head, but missing as Kumo wove in and out waiting for the best moment to strike.

"There's no way you're going to graduate, if all you can do is dodge." Kiba growled, this time trying to push her towards the edge of the ring surrounding them.

"Than what does that say about you if you can't land a punch on one little girl?" Kumo shot back, finally throwing a punch of her own, only to be blocked by the growling boy.

"You can't even throw a decent punch!" Kiba laughed kicking his leg towards her with such force that she barely had time to dodge it.

The two spent the next few minutes trading punches, Kumo weaving in and out of Kiba's attacks with such grace, one would think she was dancing. They both eventually stopped back in the center of the ring, Kiba breathing harder than his opponent.

Kumo stole a quick look at the students on the sidelines, whom she could tell were getting more bored as time wore on, the few of them who had been paying attention having lost interest. She looked back at the Inuzuka as he spoke up once more.

"You know," he started, a smirk working its way across his face. "I bet your dad isn't even on a mission."

Kumo narrowed her eyes and lowered herself back in to her taijutsu stance, not liking where Kiba was going. Her feet were situated shoulder width apart with her left foot pointing towards her opponent. Her right arm was crossed across her body in front of her chest, and her left arm was held forwards, both arms bent at the elbow, and her fingers spread apart and slightly curled as small sparks of electricity started to bounce between the tips. Her heart rate increased as she took a deep breath trying not to let what Kiba was going to say affect her.

"Yeah," Kiba showed a toothy grin as he too settled in to his taijutsu stance. His body was square to Kumo, his right foot slightly behind his body. His right arm pulled behind his head, and his left arm pointing towards the ground, his hands opened and flexed creating the illusion of him having claws. "In fact, I bet he left you here. Alone. On purpose." Kumo's heart rate quickened as she tried to ignore what he was saying, "I mean being as pitiful of a fighter you are, I'm sure you were too much of an embarrassment!"

Kumo took a step forward only to freeze, hearing some of the other students laugh in agreement. She turned her head and glared at them, some of the students shrinking back under her gaze. Turning her head back to Kiba she gritted her teeth as she met a foot in the face, causing her to fly back with such force she went tumbling head over heel towards the edge of the ring.

She could hear Kiba hooting and hollering as well as Naruto shouting "No!" as she poured chakra into her hands and dug them in to the ground, trying to create enough friction to stop herself before she left the ring.

"See, you don't even know that you shouldn't turn your back on your enemy!"

Kumo gritted her teeth, skin tearing off the palms of her hands as she came grinding to a stop in a hand stand mere centimeters from the edge of the ring. Turning her head up from facing the ground she saw Kiba facing the crowd and bowing as some of the students cheered for him. Making sure to be as quiet as possible she slowly lowered herself to the ground, making sure to keep her feet in front of the line.

Her feet back on the ground, she took off towards Kiba, electricity dancing on her fingertips. She got four feet behind him when Akamaru started barking alerting Kiba of her advanced, giving him enough warning to jump out of the way.

"Couldn't just stay down, Tomato-paste?"

Kumo didn't respond to him, and charged again this time with enough speed that her hand hit its mark, causing Kiba to growl in pain.

"Ouch! What the hell was that!" Kiba grabbed a hold of his shoulder jumping away from her as a pained frown graced his features.

Kumo just raised an eyebrow in response and closed the distance between the two of them bringing their fight in for more hand-to-hand combat than it had been so far. Kumo succeeded in getting several more hits in, each time the brunette boy hissing in pain as the electricity that danced through her fingers zapped him, before he finally managed to jump away and make distance again between the two of them.

"I'M SICK OF YOU!" Kiba growled from his position on the far side of the ring from her.

"What, scared of getting beaten by a girl?" Kumo snapped back, not allowing herself to drop out of her stance.

"Like I'm going to allow myself to be beaten by a girl!" Kiba brought his hands together and started to make hand signs. "FANG OVER FANG!"

Akamaru jumped up on top of Kiba's back and the two of them turned into rapidly spinning drills heading straight towards their target: Kumo.

The world around Kumo seemed to slow down as she saw the two rapidly spinning towards her. She flexed her legs to jump out of their way, only to widen her eyes in surprise as she found she couldn't move. She quickly looked around to find an alternate way out, her heart rate quickening with every passing second.

She saw Iruka, a horrified look across his face as he ran in slow motion towards her. She saw Mizuki at the back of the crowd, with a small twisted grin on his face, and his arms crossed against his chest. Naruto was in the process of running towards her, panic written across his face. And there was the boy who sat next to her in class-Shikamaru- was sitting in a kneeling position with his hands brought together in the rat symbol. Confusion ran through her mind as she continued to look at Shikamaru, his eyes were glassy, and his shadow- his shadow was stretching further from his body than what was normal. Her eyes followed his shadow, and her confusion turned into a cross between panic, realization, and fear, as she realized that his shadow was connected to hers.

Flashback-no-jutsu

"Daddy!" a five-year-old Satsuki called, looking up from the book that she was reading.

"What's up, pup?" Her father called from inside the kitchen, his voice traveling as he came to meet her in the living room.

"This book!" She grabbed both sides of the book 'Tales of the Henohenomoheji' and held it up for him to see. "The people in it, they're so cool!" She giggled and twisted the book back towards herself and laid it in her lap.

"Oh?" Minoru's eyes turned upwards as he smiled at his young charge and motioned for her to move over to let him sit next to her.

Satsuki eagerly moved to the side, allowing her father to sit down next to her, and she promptly crawled in to his lap and made herself comfortable.

"Yeah! It's about Omoidegakure no Sato, The Village Hidden in the Memories. It's a Hidden Village, with ninjas just like Kirigakure!" Satsuki paused, touching her chin in thought as a small frown graced her mask free face. "Well, I guess it would be, if it was a real village." She made a small shrugging motion before continuing in her tale. "Well this village it has all sorts of shinobi who can do amazing things! There's a clan who uses trained dogs to help them fight, and another that uses this thing that lets them, like, know what their opponent is going to do next!" Satsuki continued weaving the tale of her story to her father waving her arms as she told of what adventures the characters had partaken in so far in the book, before stopping abruptly. "And then I just got to a part where some one was able to control their shadow!" Her eyes were wide as she flopped over sideways, hanging off of her father's lap on to the couch.

"Their shadow?" There was an amused lilt in his voice as he urged her to go on.

"Yeah! His team was cornered!" Satsuki quickly picked her self back up in to a sitting position and jumped off of her father's lap and stopped once she was standing in front of him. "His team had taken an EXTREMELY important mission for the Yumekage. They couldn't fail. But Inei-san wasn't going to sacrifice his comrades. He was worried, but he thought through all the possibilities. LIKE ALL THE POSSIBILITIES." Satsuki made a grand sweeping motion with her arms before continuing. "And he finally came up with a plan. It wasn't foolproof, but he knew with the help of his comrades, that they could do it. They fought for HOURS, and finally Inei-san and his team FINALLY turned the tables and cornered the enemy. 'I wish I didn't have to do this, boys.'" Satsuki imitated how she interpreted Inei-san's voice, gruff and low, and ended with a small chuck. "'But it's for the benefit of not just our village, but the world.' And then-" Satsuki brought her hands up in front of her. "He put his hands together in a symbol, and his shadow attached to the enemies and they couldn't move. Inei-san's shadow traveled up their bodies and-" Satsuki made a quick wringing motion in front of her and dropping unceremoniously to the floor "He, like, snapped their necks!" Satsuki picked her head up from the floor and looked up to her father who was still on the couch.

"Well," her father chucked lightly, "I guess it's a good thing that it's just a story, and no-one can actually manipulate their shadows, huh?"

KAI

Shikamaru could manipulate shadows just like the character Inei-san from her book. This was not good.

Kumo looked from Shikamaru back to the incoming figure of Kiba and Akamaru. She struggled against the shadows holding her in place but was unable to get them to budge, and looking back to Iruka-Sensei, who was no-where close enough to save her from her impending doom.

'What do I do?' Satsuki thought to herself, her panic rising to high levels. 'I can't die, not here! Ugh! If only I could move!' Thoughts raced through her mind, unable to give her a way to fully formulate any plan as Kiba came closer and closer to her. As her thoughts continued to race, she felt an immense burning sensation spiraling out from her stomach, causing her to close her eyes and grimace at the pain as Kiba came inches from her face.

The crowd looked on in a mix of horror and fascination waiting to see how the red-head was going to get herself out of her current situation, when, without the ability for Kumo to move, Kiba hit his mark. There was a collective gasp as time seemed to freeze and Kumo suddenly erupted into a thousand silver and red flowers, her body no-where to be found.

The flowers gracefully floated to the ground and not a sound was heard throughout the group of students as everyone tried to process what had just happened. The ninjas-in-training sat in shock staring at the flowers as the wind slowly picked up and carted the flowers away scattering them in the wind.

After what seemed like hours, one student finally got up the courage to say what everyone was thinking: "What the hell just happened?"

Kumo slowly opened her eyes as the burning sensation in her stomach slowly dissipated away, and confusion graced her face as she took in her surroundings.

It appeared that the sun had already set. The moon was full, and shining at full brightness as it sat high in the sky. She was standing in the middle of the woods with tall trees lush with foliage surrounded her on every side. She could see the gnarled roots of the trees twisting around and over each other causing the trees to grow in tilted angles, and the moonlight caused the trees to cast menacing shadows across patchy-grass ground.

"What happened?" she murmured to herself as she walked up to one of the gnarled trees and reached her hand out to touch it. "Where am I?"

She touched the cool bark of the tree only to instantly pull it back as she heard a low growl echoing through the forest.

"What was that?"

"Why. Don't. You. Come. Find. Out." A smooth, low voice echoed across the woods, and Kumo twisted her head in every direction trying to pinpoint exactly where it was coming from.

"You know what?" Kumo spoke out loud, crossing her arms across her chest. "I think I'll pass. My dad always taught me to never talk to strangers."

A low laugh rang across the clearing, sending shivers down Kumo's spine. "And look how far that has gotten you so far."

"And what exactly is that supposed to mean?" she asked, raising her eybrow as she backed up.

"Nothing to worry your pretty little head about." The voice again laughed through the trees.

"Yeah, well, I think I'm over this, so I'm just going to leave." She nervously put her hands behind her head and turned and walked away from the direction that she had finally pinpointed the voice as coming from.

"No, worries, you will be back after all." The voice spoke with an overly confident lilt. "I made sure of it."

Kumo paused and turned back towards the voice.

"What is that supposed to mean?!"

"I'm done with you child. Get out."

"Wait, no!" Kumo took off running towards the voice at full speed, trying to keep herself from tripping over the twisted roots.

"By the way, I would duck if I were you."

"Duck? What do you mean by that?"

Before Kumo even had the chance to finish her question, the landscape around her started to disappear. The branches of the trees seemed to droop, and the colour dripped from the leaves in huge water droplets, as the scenery around her seemingly melted in to the ground blow her, slowly blurring her vision, and making her dizzy, causing her to close her eyes.

"Du~uck." The voice echoed once more through her head in a sing song pattern, and without recognizing her actions, Kumo bent backwards. As the palms of her hands hit the ground just behind her head, she hissed in pain, and as she felt the air shift just inches above where her stomach was, where her upper half had been only seconds earlier, she kicked her foot upwards as hard as she could surprising herself when her foot contacted something.

Kumo continued to use her momentum to flip herself back up onto her feet in a standing position just in time to raise her arm to block a fist that came towards her face.

"What the?" Kumo muttered as she continued to dodge the fists as they came at her, not giving her a chance to fully grasp what was going on. Kumo was forced to take steps back as the person attacking her never relented on their attacks.

"Ouch!" Kumo hissed, as something jabbed her in the right shoulder, causing her arm to drop limp at her side. She stole a glance at her now useless appendage and then behind her to see what caused it as she dodged another incoming kick.

A frown crossed her face as she focused chakra to her left hand, electricity jumping from the tips. Taking a deep breath as she jumped back from the onslaught of attacks she grabbed ahold of her right shoulder and forced a small amount of her electricity into the useless appendage. She held back a shout as the electricity ran through her arm, and she slowly flexed her fingers as some of the feeling returned.

She sank down in to the opening stance of her taijutsu style and looked back up to her attackers. "Why are you attacking me?" her voice was cool, and calm, complete opposite of what was occurring internally.

She held a calculating gaze across the area she was in, and the people who were occupying the space with her. She was in an open field, with a forest on two of the sides, and the other two had different paths leading in to the village. There were weapons littered across the field, large craters in the dirt, and several trees were in pieces: everything about it screamed training ground.

There were four other people aside from her in the field. There was a girl with brown eyes who had her brown hair in twin buns. She wore a pink shirt with yellow clasps, and blue pants that were taped at the right thigh and a holster strapped to it. She was perched on a nearby tree, her head propped up on her hand as she looked as if she was uninterested in what had just gone on.

There was a boy with long brown hair, and pale white eyes. He wore a beige short sleeved shirt and brown shorts that were taped just as the girls' pants were, and his right arm and right leg were completely wrapped up in white tape. His arms were crossed across his chest, and he wore a frown across his face as if he were annoyed at everything that had just transpired.

The last two people looked almost identical. They both wore green jumpsuits, with bright orange leg warms around their calves. They had bowl cuts and big bushy eyebrows that reminded Kumo of the poisonous caterpillars she was always warned about touching. The biggest difference about the two of them was one of the two was older. The older of the two wore the standard Chuunin vest and stood a decent length from the younger one with his hands were on his hips, a mischievous look gracing his face. The younger stood no more than five feet away from Kumo and had his arms limp at his sides, and his mouth was gaping open almost like a fish.

"Do I need to ask again?" Kumo asked, an edge in her voice that she didn't know she possessed. She stepped closer to the jumpsuit wearing ninja, the electricity now crackling loudly between her fingers.

Almost as if someone had flipped a switch, the flabbergasted look was gone from his face and he walked closer to Kumo.

"YOU ARE A MOST YOUTHFUL OPPONENT!"

"A what?" annoyance seeped its way in to Kumo's voice as she took a step backwards.

"THE FLAMES OF YOUTH BURN BRIGHTLY IN YOU! I HAVE NEVER SEEN SOMEONE SHAKE OFF ONE OF NEJI'S ATTACK SO EASILY BEFORE!" Instantly the boy was bouncing around her and inspecting her from every angle as if she was on exhibit.

"You know, he does have a point." The kunoichi sitting up in the tree spoke up as she jumped down from her perch. "How did you do it?"

Kumo looked between the three with distrust, not sure of what exactly was going on. Deciding against answering their question, she asked one of her own. "Where am I?"

"You don't know where you are?!" The boy in green exclaimed as if the idea was unfathomable. "Why you are in the Village Hidden in the Leaves!"

"Lee, she could be a spy." The boy with the pale eyes spoke up, distrust clearly written across his features.

"I'm from Konoha," Kumo stated, looking lazily back at the boy before turning her attention back to the boy who reminded her so much of Naruto. "I go to the academy. How did I get here?"

"YOU'RE FROM THE ACADEMY?!" Once again, the bushy browed ninja shouted as if it had to be impossible.

"That is most intriguing!" A deep voice echoed through the clearing, and the older of the two jump suited ninjas finally entered the conversation. He walked up behind his doppelganger and put his hand on the younger one's shoulder. "That was a very advanced technique that you showed for someone of your age! Your will of fire burns bright!"

"What are you talking about?" Kumo asked straightening herself up to her full height as her arm once more dropped limply to her side.

"You truly do not know?" The concern across the boy's face was true as he stepped closer to her. "You appeared in an explosion of red and silver flowers!"

"I what?" confusion crossed her eyes, before she narrowed them asking a further question. "Then why did you attack me?"

"Neji-san and I were in the middle of a training spar, and you appeared right in the middle of it! It was not our intention to harm you, right Neji?" The boy in green looked pointedly to the long-haired brunette boy behind her.

"Lee is correct. If we had wished to harm you, then you would most likely be dead." Neji's voice held an even tone so much so that it almost came across as cocky.

"Oh, come-on Neji, she's just a little girl. You wouldn't really have hurt her." The girl in pink spoke up.

"I would have if she were a spy, Tenten. I am a ninja of the Leaf Village, and I will act as such. Even if that means harming children." The boy leaned back on the tree behind him and closed his eyes, signaling that he was done with the conversation.

"You don't have to be such a stick in the mud." Tenten pouted at Neji before turning her attention back to Kumo. "How did you fix your arm from Neji's attack?"

"Electricity can do many amazing things," Kumo looked back down at her still limp arm. "It was a temporary fix that I was taught at a young age, but it did not fix the problem. Neji-san, was it?" the boy in questioned opened one eye in response to her question. "Can you please properly fix my arm?"

The boy moodily walked from the tree up behind Kumo and with a small "Hn" quickly jabbed at Kumo's shoulder.

The red head smiled in relief as the feeling fully returned to her arm, and she turned around and gave a small bow to Neji. "Thank you for your assistance."

"Now, Miss Academy Student, how did you manage to appear in an explosion of flowers" The older ninja asked her kneeling down to her level.

"Gai-sensei asks the most appropriate question! How did you, and who are you?" Lee semi-echoed the so-called Gai-sensei.

"My name is Hayashi, Kumo, and I'm sorry, Shinobi-san, but I don't know what you are talking about with flowers or appearing anywhere. One moment, I'm stuck by a shadow with a human drill coming at my face, and then the next-" Kumo paused briefly as she carefully formulated her next sentence. "And then the next, I'm dodging attacks from, I'm guessing, Lee-san and Neji-san."

"Kumo, you say?" a wistful look briefly crossed Gai's face, "Well I'm sure there is a reasonable explanation for all of this!" a large grin spread across his face as he stuck a thumb up in the air. "Until that explanation can be found though, we must get you back to the academy! I'm sure your teacher is worried about you!"

Realizing that the older ninja was correct in his assumptions, Iruka-Sensei was probably worrying himself sick, she nodded her head in agreement.

"Tenten, Neji, Lee!" Each student stood up at attention as their names were called. "That is enough training for today, you are all dismissed. Meet back here at 0430 for warm-ups!"

Tenten grumbled in agreeance as she started to walk away from the group, and Neji simply hmphed as he too walked away.

"Kumo-san!" Lee said exuberantly holding his hand out for her to shake. "You were a worthy opponent for one who has yet to graduate the academy." Kumo reluctantly stuck her hand out to shake hands with him, "We shall soon see who's will of fire burns the brightest, rival!" with that the boy dropped Kumo's hand and took off running after his other two teammates, leaving Kumo with their sensei-Gai.

"I'm sure I could find my own way back, Gai-sensei. You did not have to call your training short on my account." Kumo bowed her head respectfully to the older shinobi.

"Nonsense! It is my honor to escort one with as much youth, and will of fire as you back to the academy!" A smile crossed his face as he started walking towards town. "Come, Kumo-chan, tell me about yourself."

I hope y'all enjoyed the chapter. Till next time.